Recommendation%20for%20a%20World%20Virtual%20School%20project

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Recommendation for a World Virtual School project
Neven Soric American International School of
Zagreb Sanja Kišicek Faculty of Humanities and
Social Sciences Damir Boras Faculty of
Humanities and Social Sciences
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Introduction

• Virtual Learning Environments (VLE)
• collaboration
• World Virtual School (WVS)
• a project sponsored by the U.S. Department of
  State Office of Overseas Schools
• eight major international school regions
• WVS Advisory Group eight representatives

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Eight major international school regions

• Central and Eastern European Schools Association
  (CEESA)
• Association of International Schools in Africa
  (AISA)
• Near East South Asia Council of Overseas Schools
  (NESA)
• The East Asia Regional Council of Overseas
  Schools (EARCOS)
• Association of American Schools in South America
  (AASSA)
• The Association of American Schools of Central
  America, Colombia, Caribbean and Mexico (TRI-A)
• The European Council of International Schools
  (ECIS)
• The Mediterranean Association of International
  Schools (MAIS)

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The WVS project is based on the following
assumptions

• schools value the integration of relevant and
  effective online resources for their varied
  learning communities
• schools value working regionally to collaborate
  and to share perspectives and methodologies and
  to consider and nurture best practices
• schools value their integrity in the face of
  adversity and seek cost-effective and reliable
  means of assuring continuity of operations.

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Survey on the usage of VLE in schools

• the primary goal to gather baseline information
  that would help the WVS Group establish VLE
  practices and potential needs
• developed by the members of the WVS Advisory
  Group
• conducted via Free Online Surveys from
  mid-September to early November 2007
• 114 schools altogether from eight major
  international school regions
• 28 small ( lt 250 students )
• 53 medium (251-850 students)
• 33 large schools ( gt students)

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... the survey

• two most popular VLEs
• Moodle
• Blackborad

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The frequency of VLE usage in small, medium and
large schools
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Recommendations for the WVS project

• A VLE system has to be relevant, accessible,
  durable and affordable.

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... recommendations

• WVS group should act as a knowledge building and
  advisory group, working with the Directors of
  eight international regions
• recommendation for a Moodle ASP (application
  service provider) IT company
• a possibility to contract a Moodle integrator to
  set up a server, off-site, with Moodle service(s)
• a concept of site security
• offsite
• onsite

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Example CEESA project

• a pilot project
• an example how all international schools in the
  world can work in VLE
• schools introducing VLE into their everyday
  school life

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Hierarchical WVS structure plan
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Conclusion

• this way we would provide the schools with a
  stable VLE system that requires as little
  administration for current school staff
• it should ensure stability and durability for the
  system

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• Thank you for your attention!
• Questions?